Ceres froze as she stood outside of the kitchen. She could hear her Mama's sniffling and the few sobs she let out every now and then, but she was too afraid to actually approach the distressed woman.

"He would have loved this..." Serena muttered as she looked down at the stuffed turtle in her hands.

She didn't mean to buy it but for some reason, she couldn't help but think of Max, who she wouldn't get to see grow up. He was only a baby and yet she still did what she did, and now the feelings of guilt were flooding back to her.

She was aware. She was fully aware of the consequences she would have to face by leaving her family, but yet at the time, she didn't care or realize just how bad what she had done was.

What was the point in thinking about it now? There was no way she could ever go back to try and fix the ties that were completely severed between her and her family. It just wasn't something that was possible or going to end up in her favor.

Serena got the feeling that she was being stared at and looked up only to see Ceres, who was peaking her head into the room, and said girl flinched upon being noticed.

Serena gave one last glance at the turtle before letting out a sigh.

"I guess you can have it now" Serena said as she tossed the turtle on the ground and went into her room.

Ceres looked down at the small turtle plush that had been thrown at her feet before she bent down to pick it up.

In some ways, in that moment, she had felt just like the turtle. Tossed to the side and ignored. When looking into the turtle's black beady eyes, Ceres decided that she would treat it with as much care and love as she could. She'd do better than her Mama who had so easily given up on it.

"I'll take care of you" Ceres muttered as she clutched the turtle to her chest.

~ Present Time, Ceres' P.O.V. ~

"Oh come on, it's my birthday for crying out loud! You can't just say one nice thing to me?" Kade cried as he looked at Max with his hands on his hips.

Max, who was sitting next to me on his phone, just raised an eyebrow at Kade.

"I said happy birthday, was that not nice enough?" Max asked and Kade huffed.

"You said 'Happy birthday old man' and that is hardly nice. I'm not old at all!" Kade said.

"You're three years shy of thirty" Max said and Kade glared.

"See? This is what I'm talking about" Kade said and I just sighed as I listened to their back and forth bickering. Well it was a more one sided argument on Kade's part as Max didn't really seem to care about the conversation.

"A compliment wouldn't kill you, y'know? Something along the lines of beautiful, gorgeous, handsome, stunning, or pretty" Kade continued and Max scoffed.

"More like conceited, narcissistic, egotistical, vain, and annoying"

"I am none of those things!"

"Ceres, come with me for a second?" When hearing Lance call out to me, I was quick to dash from the room as I no longer was interested in hearing those two bicker.

"Riki and Erika are going to be here in a little while to help set up for the surprise party. I'd appreciate it if you'd help Riki make some runs to the store" he said and I nodded.

The surprise party was going to be a small barbecue in the backyard. Lucas and Ares were cleaning the grill right now and Max was given the task of distracting Kade while they did so which was pretty much working right about now.

When Riki and Erika arrived, the two were shoved into the backyard where some of my other brothers were. With all of us here, Papa had started to run us through the plan for today.

"Erika, you're the one whose best at distracting Kade. You and Max can take him away for a couple of hours so that we can start decorating" Papa instructed and Erika made a salute before going off to find Kade.

"Riki, Ceres is going to come along with you so that you guys can pick up some stuff" Papa said looking over to Riki who just nodded.

"Once Erika gets Kade out of the house, Roman will start on the food" Papa said and Roman gave a thumbs up. Just then, Ares and Lucas who had finished cleaning the grill came over to us.

"Oh, you two are finished. Lucas, can you help Roman with the food?" Lance asked and Lucas nodded.

"Ares, you will help us decorate" Papa said and Ares just shrugged as he took the gloves off of his hands.

"Okay, now that everyone understands their parts, let's get to work" Papa said and with that, we all split up to begin our tasks.

I had been entrusted with the shopping list so I made sure to tuck it away safely in my pocket.

"So, what's up Ceres? I know we haven't gotten to see each other at all aside from that one time" Riki said as we drove down the streets.

"We've done a lot of stuff since then" I said and started to explain all the fun things we had did this past month and by the end of it, Riki was laughing hysterically.

"Man, these guys never change. When Erika and I were little, we'd spend summers with them and they were definitely some interesting summers. I hope their craziness isn't driving you mad yet" Riki said as he parked the car.

"No, it's very fun. I enjoy it so much" I said and Riki grinned.

"That's good. Now, let's go get this stuff" Riki said and we both headed out of the car.

~ With Erika, Max, and Kade: Third P.O.V. ~

Max thought his ears were going to fall off with just how much Kade and Erika were talking. The two were little gossipers whenever put together and ran their mouths all day long.

While Kade was confused as to why Erika and Riki were there, Erika quickly justified it with them being there to say 'happy birthday' which Kade had no complaints about at all.

Erika had decided that the best way to distract Kade was to go shopping which definitely worked as the two adults were having a blast trying on all the different clothing while Max just sat in the chairs bored out of his mind.

"Max, what do you think about this one?" Erika said as she looked to Max who had practically become one with the chair with how sunken into the cushion he was.

"Looks good" Max said simply without even looking at the dress and Erika pouted.

"Max, you're supposed to be helping" She whispered and Max groaned.

"Helping? With what? He's clearly having the time of his life" Max said as he motioned over to Kade who was admiring himself in the mirror.

"Oh just play along will you? You know what, you need a wardrobe change yourself. Half of your clothing is probably stained with paint" Erika said and Max frowned but said nothing as Erika was technically correct.

"No thanks, I'd rather not waste my money on tacky clothing" Max muttered but Erika had heard him and gasped at his words.

"Tacky?! You little brat, these clothes are totally cute!" Erika exclaimed and Max just sighed as he realized he had dug himself into a hole with his comment.

~ At the Spencer Household, Third P.O.V. ~

"Fuck!" Ares cried when the balloon he had been blowing up bursted and his lips were now stinging again. Ares had been attempting to successfully blow up a balloon but all of them just kept bursting in his face and he was fed up.

"Someone else do this shit!" He said as he pushed the balloons to the side with a pout.

"Maybe if you wouldn't blow so hard, you wouldn't break them" Lance said as he picked up the abandoned pack of balloons.

They had gotten through a lot of the decorations outside and now they just needed to finish up the balloons. Ceres and Riki had come back from the store and also helped out with the decorations which made things go much faster.

"You guys almost done in here?" Arthur asked as he checked in on Lucas and Roman.

"Cake is in the oven and the meat is seasoned and ready to be grilled" Roman said and Arthur nodded.

"Once the cake is finished, let me know" Arthur said before walking back out to the living room where his other children were still trying to blow up the balloons.

Everything had thankfully been on track and although the Spencer family hardly threw parties, Arthur had to say that they were doing a pretty good job.

Once Roman was finished with the cake, Arthur had sent a text to Erika to tell her that they were ready and now it was all just a matter of waiting for the trio to get home.

"We were really out there for a long time, huh?" Kade said as the three of them walked into the house. He had checked his watch and saw that it was nearly three in the afternoon.

Erika had urged Kade to put his bags down and follow her but when Kade started asking questions, Max just grabbed his arm and begun to drag him to the backyard.

"Maxi, why are you-"

"Surprise!!"

Kade looked at everyone as they all screamed at him. Ares even let off a popper and Kade just smiled as Erika and Max had joined the small group.

"This is the part where I pretend to be surprised, right? Wow you guys, this is so amazing!! Thank you so much!" Kade cheered and everyone looked at him in surprise.

"What? What do you mean 'pretend'?" Roman asked with a frown.

"Mm, I didn't really think much of it when Erika wanted to go shopping but Max tagging along was a dead giveaway" Kade explained and Max frowned.

"So I went for fucking nothing? That's years on my life span that I'm never getting back" Max said with a frown.

"Years? We were there for a couple of hours" Erika said.

"Exactly, years" Max said before walking off.

"Ah, well. It can't be helped. Let's start the party, yes?" Arthur said with a short chuckle.

The small barbecue was off to a good start and Arthur couldn't help but smile to himself when looking at everyone.

"You never change, you know? You'll be thirty next year with no spouse or children" Erika said and Lance frowned.

"I hardly think that's any of your concern" Lance said with a sigh.

Moving his eyes over to Kade and Lucas, Arthur could see them having some sort of struggle.

"Oh come on, it's not like I'm gonna eat the cake! Besides, it's my birthday, I'm supposed to be able to do whatever I want!" Kade cried as he kept trying to get a taste of the delicious cake that was sitting on the table.

"What are you, 5?" Lucas asked as he kept tugging Kade away from the cake.

Over to the side, Ares, Max, and Riki seemed to be having a surprisingly decent conversation. At least that's what it looked like to Arthur.

"And then, I sprayed this in his face" Ares said as he proudly held up his pranksters fart spray. Riki's mouth dropped when seeing that.

"Dude, that's foul" Riki said as he scrunched up his face.

"Wanna smell?" Ares said and Riki backed away with a pale face when seeing Ares about to spray some of the rancid spray.

"Spray that and I'm going to choke you to death" Max said as he glared at Ares who just chuckled.

"I'm just kidding!" He said and placed the spray back in his pocket.

Looking over to the last of his children, he saw Ceres holding out her box of bagel bites to Roman. It looked like she was asking him to grill them.

"Ceres, I'm not grilling your bagel bites. That wouldn't even taste good" Roman said and Ceres shook her head.

"You don't know if you don't try" She said and Roman sighed.

"Ceres, please put them away and wait for the real food" He said and Ceres pouted.

"Come on Bubble" Ceres said and Bubble followed her back into the house.

'Who do these children get their weirdness from...?' Arthur thought to himself.

A little while later after everyone had eaten, Kade called everyone over for the gift opening.

"Okay, this first one is from...Max!" Kade said as he picked out the box shaped gift. It was clearly different from Max's usual homemade gifts.

"It's kind of big, what is that?" Ares asked and Max shrugged.

"Wait til he opens it" he said simply.

When ripping off the wrapping paper, Kade's eyes widened when he saw a DVD player inside.

"You're always complaining about how you can't watch your old movies so now you can" Max said and Kade smiled.

"Max, you didn't have to spend so much money on something like this" Kade said and Max grinned.

"Don't worry about that. It's pre-owned" he said giving a thumbs up and Kade just chuckled.

"Thank you" he said and set the gift to the side.

The next gift Kade opened was one from Riki and Erika.

"Oooh, a new mirror. And this one lights up, thank you!" Kade said and Erika smiled.

"I always have an eye for good things don't I?" She said cheekily.

"Not with that tacky clothing..." Max muttered and Erika glared to which he just shrugged.

The next gift was apparently a joint gift from Lucas and Lance.

"How to talk to women...what kind of joke is this?" Kade muttered as he looked at the book in his hand. He looked up to the two who were just nodding in approval at their gift choice.

Kade just dropped the book to the ground before picking up the next gift and squealed when he saw that it was from Ceres.

"Would you open the gift already?!" Max yelled as Kade was taking his time to gently unwrap the present.

"Don't rush me!" Kade yelled back.

At first all Kade saw was a brown box but when he opened it, inside was probably the ugliest stuffed...thing? he'd ever seen in his life.

"It's you. I made it myself" Ceres said as she smiled and Kade covered his mouth as he let a tear fall.

'It's so ugly...but in a cute way!' He thought.

"I love it so much, thank you honey" Kade cried and Ceres beamed when hearing Kade's words.

"He's lying right through those fake tears" Ares muttered and Max nodded.

The next gift Kade went to open was from Ares and Kade gasped when seeing it.

"This might be...the best gift you have ever given someone" Kade said as he admired it and everyone looked confused when hearing that.

"What? What the hell did he give you?" Riki asked and Kade held up his gift.

"Look how beautiful it is!" Kade cried and in his hands was just a framed photo of himself and Ares grinned.

"I knew you'd love it" Ares said and everyone was just in silence, too stunned to say anything and frankly it didn't surprise any of them.

"Wait a minute, isn't that photo from the family- mmph?!" Max's mouth was covered instantly by Ares who gave him a 'shut-up-if-you-know-what's-good-for-you' look.

"This one is going on the top shelf" Kade said. The top shelf was where Kade put all of his precious and important things and now he had two things to add to it.

"This man's vanity is truly something else" Riki muttered and his sister nodded in agreement.

Roman's present was the next to be unwrapped and Kade let out another gasp when seeing the gift.

"Where did you find this?! I've looked everywhere but it's been sold out!" Kade exclaimed as he clutched the latest installment of his favorite romance series to his chest.

"I know a guy" Roman said with a chuckle but the comment seemed to go right over Kade's head.

"I can't wait to read it!" Kade cheered.

The last present left was from Arthur who just sipped on his soda as he watched Kade open the gift.

"A plane ticket to Hawaii?!" Kade exclaimed and in an instant everyone was in Arthur's face.

"Where the hell was my plane ticket to Hawaii?" - Lance

"This is totally unfair!" - Ares

"Uncle Arthur, we're practically your kids too!" - Riki

Arthur just continued to sip his soda unbothered as everyone argued.

"You'll just have to wait your turns" Arthur said with a shrug.

Needless to say, Arthur would be hearing about this for the next couple of weeks.